Serendipity

music: TMS

The other day I was a few minutes early for a hairdresser’s appointment, so nipped into the charity shop opposite. There amongst the usual rubbish was the familiar grey spine of a Persephone book. Whipped it out and found it was one I’d been wanting to read. As-new condition, complete with bookmark. Gardener’s Nightcap by Muriel Stuart is the chatty, random thoughts type of gardening book it’s so nice to dip into. Here’s a taster from the beginning:‘And then to bed, to lie with one’s face to the uncurtained window, thinking of seed-sowing, and pruning and mulching, and slug hunting, and this year’s done, and next year’s doings, and all the other garden preoccupations that obtrude themselves so pleasantly before a gardener sleeps.’